


Amazing Grace

by Annie46fic



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Fallen Angels, Gen, Hurt Sam Winchester, Season/Series 08 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-29
Updated: 2013-07-29
Packaged: 2017-12-21 18:30:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/903468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annie46fic/pseuds/Annie46fic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She never knew how she lost her memory or why there are so many more like her until she meets the mysterious black-haired man who takes her to meet a man who may or may not be able to help her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Amazing Grace

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote most of this when drunk and/or tired so it may not make any sense. This is my take on what might happen after the finale. I should have worked on it further but wanted to post it before any spoilers.

They released her from hospital when it was obvious that nothing more could be done for her. 

She had been found; face down, in the middle of a clearing somewhere in the wilds of Blackwater Ridge. Her clothes had been torn from her body and she was half-naked. Apart from that there hadn’t been a mark on her and nobody could explain it.

She had lost all memory of what had gone before; they had to make second guesses at everything, her age, her race, and her religion. They told her she was beautiful, that she was only very young; they told her they thought she might be from somewhere a long way from here. They named her Grace.

It was odd really that, when she was released from hospital, she found so many others like her. Men and women who had been found in odd places, all of them fit and healthy, all of them complete and whole and yet, where their memory should be there was a black-hole that no one was able to fill.

They formed a community; a small holding on the outskirts of Kansas, some of them managed to get jobs, others used skills they never knew they had, to build outhouses and fences, barns and chicken coops. They kept sheep and pigs, had a cow or two for milking. Some of the women made bread whilst one of the men could fry a mean fish dinner. They were happy in their ignorance and became used to their existence but Grace would often lie awake at night and question her origins, wondering how and why. 

***

Two summers passed and Grace was in the fields picking beets. It was a tiresome job but beets could get her a few dollars at the farmer’s market so she rolled up her sleeves and got down to it. In the distance she could see the truck they jointly owned kicking up dust as it wound its way down the steep incline to where their barns were. It was filling up for the day before taking the produce they had into town. They made enough money to survive each day and it was satisfying not to rely on anyone but each other.

She was bending over so she didn’t hear the man approach, only seeing him when she lifted her head, her heart giving a little leap as her eyes met piercing blue ones. She wiped the sweat from her brow and rubbed her hand through her hair.

“Who are you?”

“I am Castiel.” The man approached her slowly and she took in his appearance. He wasn’t that tall but very slender, his black hair long enough to brush the collar of the white shirt he wore. His legs were encased in shabby blue jeans that looked too large for him and his feet were bare. “I have been searching for you.”

“For me?” Her stomach clenched in both fear and anticipation.

“For all of you.”

****

Grace had no idea why she was suddenly the leader of her small community but it was she who climbed into the truck two days later, clutching the key that Castiel had handed her.

_”You must take this and come to us,” he had intoned solemnly but he hadn’t given her any further information just an address scribbled hastily in a scruffy hand. She had taken it with shaking fingers._

_“Should we all come,” she had asked and he had shaken his head._

_“Just one of you for now,” he replied, cocking his head to one side to look at her, really looking at her. “One will be enough.”_

So now she sat on the hard leather seat and adjusted it so that her feet could reach the pedals. It wasn’t far and she didn’t need a driver nor did she want one, she had been told to come alone and she would do as she had been requested even though, deep down, her fear was so great she could almost taste it.

The place she sought was hard to find; a huge door in the side of a hill, a bunker, she thought. She swallowed down every single doubt she had and held the key in her fingers. This wasn’t just the key to this door but the key to her past and maybe her future. She put her hands on the entrance for a moment, feeling the age of the place, the hardness. It had been built to keep things out but she had the feeling that nowadays it also kept things in.

The door came open with a heavy thunk and she pushed it, her arms straining. The passageway was cavernous, her breath echoing as she drew it in and pushed it out, her heart beating so fast she thought she might die from it.

“Welcome.”

Castiel was standing in a doorway but he wasn’t alone. The man with him looked to be younger, taller and much bigger, shoulders filling out the black t-shirt that he wore. His face was troubled though; she could see the lines around his eyes and mouth, the shadows that lurked beneath long lashes. His eyes were green, beautiful and piercing and his mouth was soft and pink like a woman’s.

“Is this . . .?” the man frowned sudden, his expression sour and sullen. “You gotta' be kiddin' me, Cas.”

“You have to remember it has been a full two years since - ,” Castiel spoke gently to the man, a hand on his arm. “They will not remember and this one was very young.”

Grace walked towards them. She knew she ought to say something, to ask something, to maybe even cajole them for calling her _very young_ but she can’t. The sorrow on the other man’s face and the seriousness of Castiel’s very demeanor stop her from doing anything but standing before them and tipping up her chin defiantly.

“Why am I here?” She asked, finally.

“To save my brother.”

****

She shouldn’t have come here alone; these men might be dangerous, could be murderers or worse. Grace wanted to turn back but she couldn’t, something held her there, maybe it was the desperation in the younger man’s expression or maybe the innate wisdom in Castiel’s. She shook her head.

“I can’t save anyone,” she whispered. “I . . . .”

“You can save my brother!” The younger man lurched forward and grabbed her hand. His was large and it fitted around her fingers almost hiding them. She could feel the heat radiating off him as he turned her around until they were face to face. “Please,” he said.

She shook her head but she didn’t move; frozen in place by his eyes, by the longing within them. There was an impasse then, a long period of silence when all she could hear was her heartbeat and his breathing. 

“Dean,” Castiel spoke softly. 

He moved from the doorway and gestured to Grace, indicating that she should step inside. For a moment Grace wondered if she should just pull away from them and flee, back to her small holding, back to her _family_. She knew that neither man would stop her but she still didn’t run instead she followed Castiel’s sweeping hand and walked through the doorway into what lay beyond.

The room was dark, heavy drapes drawn across the windows. She could just make out a table, a chair and a large bed. There was a bookcase against one wall and it was jammed full with books of all shapes and sizes. There was an odd scent in the air, incense maybe and the faintest tang of whiskey. She swallowed again and shuffled forward, her heart tripping double time when she realized there was someone on the bed.

Time froze as the figure sat up slowly. Grace could see the slight flex of muscle, hear soft uneven breathing and then she almost screamed out loud when the figure moved and the whole room lit up with a supernatural glow.

The man – because now she could see clearly that it was a man – seemed to be illuminated by something. His arms, his chest, all of his skin appeared to be on fire, light flooding from it. He looked as if he was in great pain; his long, thin face was worn with it, despite his radiant eyes. Long hair framed his face and it blew as if there was a breeze in the room. Grace was unable to form anything close to words and when she opened her mouth all that came out was a whimper.

“He won’t hurt you.” the man, Dean, was behind her and she could feel every line of tension in his bod. “He won’t hurt you, Grace.”

She realized she was pressed up hard against Dean’s chest, her eyes fixed on the glowing man. Beside her Castiel said something in a language that seemed familiar and yet she didn’t understand. The glowing man let out a cry and then the light went out of him almost like a punch and he pitched forward, a normal man again, pale, skinny and tired looking but a man.

“Sammy,” Dean whispered and Grace felt him move away from her and towards the other man who now lay panting on the floor of the room. “Come on man – let’s get you back in bed. You okay, little brother? Yeah, yeah it’s alright. We’ve found them, it’s gonna be alright, Sammy.”

****

Grace sipped coffee, heavily laced with whiskey, from an ungainly mug as she sat at a huge wooden table, Castiel to the right of her, Dean to the left. She wanted to ask so many questions and she had no idea where to start so she remained silent knowing, innately, that she was going to find the answers to her questions whether she asked or not.

“Sammy was trying to close the gates of Hell,” Dean spoke softly and suddenly, his words making little sense to her. She wasn’t sure she believed in God or Heaven and she certainly didn’t think she believed in Hell. She licked her dry lips and shook her head.

“I know how it sounds.” Dean’s eyes met hers and his stare was unwavering. “But, I’m telling you the truth. We had information gleaned from a lot of different sources, sources that turned out to be a little – let’s say – unreliable and Sammy never finished the job.”

“Why is he like that?” Grace’s throat hurt, her eyes stinging with tears. “Is he sick?”

“Not really,” Castiel interjected. “He is full of grace.”

“What?” She felt her stomach clench and her heart leap, a distant sliver of memory, small yet insistent in her brain. “Grace?”

“While Sam was trying to close the gates of Hell, there was another man, well an angel actually,” Castiel spoke slowly as if he were speaking to a child. “He pretended to be our friend but in reality he was anything but. He wanted to control Heaven, to throw all the angels out and to take it for himself. Unfortunately he succeeded. He made a spell and he cast all the angels out.” His blue eyes were sharp and she couldn’t look away. “They fell from Heaven. All of them. Fell like Lucifer fell, and they all landed here, right here on Earth.”

“What does this have to do with me?” Grace knew the answer but she wanted to hear it.

“Think of how you were found, think of your lack of memory, think of the others who dwell with you. Even your name . . . .” Castiel smiled a little sadly. “You are one of the Fallen.”

Grace wanted to weep; distant memories like little grains of sand were dropping one by one into her mind, the sensation of falling, the loss of something powerful and sweet, the awful feeling of homesickness, of being totally powerless. She licked her lips.

“Sam was doing the final trial when we found out that the angel – Metatron – had fooled us all. If Sam had finished the trial he would have died, the ultimate sacrifice. Dean stopped him,” Castiel was speaking low and gentle. “He thought he had saved his brother but Metatron had one last piece of vital information he had _forgotten_ to impart to us.”

“The bastard!" Dean spoke for the first time in a while, leaping up from the table and staring out of the window, his back straight and tense. “When you fell you lost your grace and Sam – Sam was already changing. He – he took in that grace, every single piece of it and it is slowly killing him.”

“Two years,” Castiel whispered. “Two years and only his strength of character and his love for his brother has kept him on this plain. He cannot die like this. There is nowhere for him to go.”

“What do you want with me?” Again she knew but she needed to hear it.

“I need you to bring your community here. I need you to take back your grace. Heaven will no longer be closed to you and you will be able to go back there, to live in paradise.”

“How do you know all of this?” Grace’s eyes stung, the memories flooding in now, the grains of sand becoming huge boulders.

“Because I am – was – an angel too. Mine was the first grace Metatron took.” Castiel’s eyes seemed to burn into her own. “Will you help us? Will you help Sam?”

She wanted to fight this, wanted to go back to the safety and security of her own little community but she knew she could not. 

“Yes,” she said, wiping the cold tears from her cheeks, chin tipped up defiantly. “Yes.”

And in the end it was simple enough.

****

Sam was laid out on the bed like a corpse. Grace could hear his heart beating; see the soft rise and fall of his chest. She bent over him and put her hand on his forehead, feeling how cold he was, how frail.

Hazel eyes, cloudy and confused, opened slowly and caught her gaze. 

“You don’t have to do this,” his voice was rough, unused.

“Yes.” she gestured to the others who came out of the darkness and laid their own hands on Sam’s shaking form. “I do.”

And then, as they all touched, the world turned orange, lights bursting, energy flowing out of Sam’s body, surging out of him like silver blood, pouring from his eyes, his mouth, his nostrils. Sam screamed then and Grace was acutely aware of the thumping on the door, knowing it was Dean and wanting this to be quick, to end.

Sam sank back onto the bed and, for the first time since she had seen him, he looked human. His hair hung wet and greasy around his pale face, his cheeks were sharp in relief and his mouth was red with blood but he was smiling weakly, eyes no longer glowing but tired.

“Thank you,” he coughed and lay back, eyes closing, breathing evening out to soft, gentle breaths.

Grace felt her own body glowing, her shoulders itching as she realized what was happening, wings bursting from her skin, white and wide, surging her upwards, her companions all around her; a holy army going home to claim their own.

****

Dean wrapped his brother up in a blanket and helped him outside; fresh air cold on his face as they looked up into the sky to see comets flying heavenwards, a light show worthy of the fourth of July.

“You okay little brother?” He asked finally, wanting to hug and to kiss, wanting to take Sammy in his arms and never let go.

“They’ve gone.” Sam smiled weakly and let his head rest on Dean’s strong shoulder, his body righting itself for the first time since he had been covered in hell hound blood in what seemed like an eternity ago. “All of them – Castiel?”

“Yeah, Cas too.” Dean grinned. “Wouldn’t want to be Metatron right now.”

“So now we have everything back to how it was,” Sam smiled into Dean’s neck. “Dick’s in Heaven and in Hell.”

“Yeah, I guess so.” Dean took in a deep breath and tipped his eyes skywards to watch the end of the show. “But fuck them all! We’re done – we’re actually done.”

And Sam could only silently agree watching the angels leave earth again taking their grace with them.

Amazing Grace.

End


End file.
